Improvement in sewing-machines



W.- WICKERSHAM.

Sewing Machine. No. 10,615. r v Patented Mar. 7} 1854.

' U ITED STATES PATENT, OFFICE.

WILLIAM WIGKERSHAM, or BOSTON, 'MAssAoHUsn'r s.

IMPROVEMENT IN SEWING-MACHINES.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 10,615, dated March 7, 1854.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, WILLIAM WICKERSHAM, of Boston, in the county of Sufiolk and State of Massachusetts, have invented a new and use- 1 ful improvement in the sewing-machine for.

view, and Fig. 2 a central vertical and longit'udinal section; and Fig. 3 is a front end elevation of my improved'sewing machine.

In the said drawings, A represents the hooked needle as applied to a vertical needle slide or carrier, B, to which a reciprocating rectilinear and vertical motion is given by a bent lever, O, acted on by a grooved cam, D, fixed onthe drivingshaft E. F is'thetable of the machine, and G is the hollow arm which rises above the same, and contains the lever O. H is the thread-carrier, which receives the thread a, that passes from the bobbin I and through a take-up spring, I), such carrier beinga bent lever worked bya grooved cam, K, and so as to laythe thread in thehook of the needle every time it descends through the cloth. The needle is provided with a closing slide, c, to its hook, which is made to work in the usual manner. There is nothing new in such machinery so far as described, it being that of a common chain-stitch sewing-machine;

nor is there anything new in the machinery by which the cloth or material to be sewed is held down on the bedand fed along under the vaction of the needle. Of such machinery, L

represents the presser, and M the feed propeller, they being operated in a manner well. known, and which, together with the mode of operating the needle-slide, is fully describedin the specification of an application for apatent recently made byme.

My invention has no reference to the feeding apparatus, only so far as it makes part of the sewing-machine.

To the needlecarrler B of the machine I aifix a second hooked needle, N, in such manner that such second needle shall stand parallel and at such a distance from the first as may be desirable. Thissecond needle I provide,

if necessary, with a.closing slide, a, and appliances to operate it like those belonging to thefirst needle. These closing slides, however,

are not necessary to my invention, as two needles made with eyes may be used, as in other well-known chain-stitch machines, in wh ch case a hooked thread-carrier would be necessary. The two needles will be moved simultaneously up and down by the action of one carrier B and its operating mechanism. The

thread-carrier H, besides the hole d for the re-' ception of the thread a, has anotherhole, e,

made through it for the reception of another thread, f, which passes through a second takeup spring, and from a secondbobbin, 0, arranged as seen in the drawings. The threadcarrier is thus made to bear two threads instead of one, as it usually does, the holes through it for their reception beingmade the same distance apart as are the two needles. By .means of an additional thread-carrier made to carry .two more threads, and providing such threads with take-up springs and making the thread-carriers to alternately lay threads in the hooks of the needles, each of the two lines of sewing may be efiected by in v terlooping two threads in chaiu stitch.

It is often very desirable to perform two parallel rows of sewing, and to do this at difl'erent times with the same-machine, or at the same time with two machines, is attended with serious difficulties. By my improved machine I produce two-perfectly-parallel lines of sewing in the same time that the machine can produce one of them. By increasingthe number of needles on the needle-carrier, and in the same proportion, the number-of the thread-holes in the thread-carrier,- and providing the machine with a corresponding number of bobbins and take-up springs, or'the equivalents thereof, a greater number of lines of sewing may beproduced at one and the same time. Thus it will be seen that my improvement becomes ahighly useful and important one, particularly to barness-makers or other workers in leather, as well as to tailors andvarious other trades.

'I do not claim' the mere duplication of a sewing-machine, or the placing of one of such machines by the side of or near to another and similar machine, so as to perform two rows of stitches by the operation of both machines; but fr What I claim as my invent-Ion consisf's more properly inf So combining, withonesewing-machinehav allel rows of stitches with separate threads, ing one needle and a thread-carrier, or their substantially as hereinbefore specified. mechanical equivalents, another or second nee- In testimony whereof I have hereto set my dle and a second hole in the'thread-carrier, or signature this 5th day of March, A. D. 1853;

the equivalents therefor, that by the action of W'ILLIAM WIGKERSHAM. the same needle-moving machinery two nee- \Vitnessesr dles are made to operate simultaneously, so as R. H.- EDDY,

to perform at one and the same time two para '1. I. HALE, Jr. 

